We ended up our stay in London with a fabulous evening! The tickets to My Fair Lady are sold out ’til October, but Jean, Betsy, and Tim went down early to see about standing room, and we got it for four shillings (54 cents). Standing room in New York is $3.75! I didn’t mind standing at all, the costumes and settings were beautiful and the play was wonderful!

Just as I’m getting used to seeing cars driving on the left-hand side of the road, and am beginning to know my way around, we have to leave for Norway at 8:00 am!

The London Silver Vaults began as the Chancery Lane Safe Deposit in 1876, a place for London residents to safely store valuables. Soon businesses began using the vaults to store valuable inventory.

After the original building was damaged during World War II, the space was rebuilt as rental units and reopened in 1953. The London Silver Vaults are now home to a group of 30 independent silver merchants and houses the largest retail collection of fine antique silver in the world.

“My Fair Lady” opened at London’s Theatre Royal, Drury Lane on April 29, 1958 and continued its run for five and a half years. Opening night was a star-studded event, with black-market tickets selling for as much as £5, almost five times the original price. The show featured Rex Harrison as Professor Higgins and Julie Andrews as Eliza Doolittle.

A BBC news report from April 29, 1958 supports Judy’s note about the the sold-out show:
“The excitement surrounding the transfer of the musical to London (from Broadway) has been intense. Advance ticket sales are estimated at over £350,000, and the first month is already sold out – with more expensive seats sold out until the end of the year.”

Got up this morning for the same old breakfast and then left at 9:15 for an all day tour of England. We had a very young bus driver who was something of a hot-rodder, and our guide, Mrs. C, was something for the books! She wore a black beret and carried this red umbrella which she stuck in the air and expected us to follow her.

For lunch, we ate down town, and then went out to Stoke Poges and saw the country church where Gray wrote his elegy.
Next we went to Windsor Castle where it rained quite hard and then stopped. (You never go anywhere in London without a rain-coat.) After that we went to Hampton Court (beautiful gardens) and then home. Everyone wanted a picture of Mrs. C with her umbrella and I nearly died laughing at Harry who kept following along behind her ’cause he wanted one from the rear!

We rushed home and Betsy, Jean, Timmy, and I got dressed to go to see Duel of Angels, a play starring Vivian Leigh and Claire Bloom. We ate dinner in a nice place after that, had huge musical fountains with colored lights.

Duel of Angels opened in April 1958 at London’s Apollo Theatre. Starring Vivien Leigh as Paola and Claire Bloom as Lucile, it was an English-language adaptation of Pour Lucrece by Jean Giraudoux. The women’s costumes were designed by none other than Christian Dior, and the Victoria & Albert Museum in London has one of Ms. Leigh’s costumes in its collection.

Changing the Guard (also known as Guard Mounting) at Buckingham Palace has been carried out since 1660. It is during this ceremony that one regiment takes over for another and The New Guard becomes The Queen’s Guard.

The ceremony is accompanied by a Guards band, playing music ranging from traditional marches to contemporary songs.

An official app from the Royal Collection was created to enhance the experience of watching the ceremony. Highlights include behind-the-scenes videos and a Kids Zone. The app is available for download from iTunes.

Got up and went to 8:00 mass with the girls from St. Mary’s. Came back and went up to get Mynie for breakfast. While I was eating Mrs. P brought me a real sweet letter from dad, and a letter from Christian, my Frenchman. (No further explanation of how Judy knows Christian, though he shows up later in the diary.)

It was certainly interesting – the figures looked real and the chamber of horrors was quite scary. There was a huge crowd there and we had fun laughing at ourselves in those crazy mirrors in the fun room!

We stopped at an English servicemen’s club for a beer with lime in it (different!) then to the Tower of London to look at the crown jewels, and then to Bunjiesfor huge plates of spaghetti.

We got back to the hotel around 9:30 and I wrote some post-cards and letters to mom and Bill. Sue and I went over across the street to have some ice-cream and then up to visit Harry and J.M. who had food-poisoning. (Angels of Mercy?)

The Crown Jewels are part of the Royal Collection and are still regularly used by The Queen during the coronation ceremony and at other formal occasions. The collection of ceremonial and symbolic objects includes crowns, sceptres, orbs, and swords.

Until 1649, this collection was kept at Westminster Abbey. Today, the Crown Jewels are housed in the Jewel House at the Tower of London. Almost everything in the Jewel House was made after 1660.

The Sovereign’s Sceptre with the Cross was created in 1661. In 1910, it was redesigned to incorporate the Cullinan I diamond. Weighing in at over 530 carats, this is the largest cut colorless diamond in the world.

Lager and Lime

A refreshing summer drink, lager and lime is just what it says it is. Add a shot of lime cordial (a sweetened, concentrated lime juice such as Rose’s Lime Juice) to a full glass of lager. Light and delicious!

I certainly didn’t get much sleep last night ’cause I was too cold! We got into London at 6:45 and I had two letters from mom and one from Bill! (Finally.) After eating at the Royal, we left for Stratford-on-Avon at 9:00. Our tour leader for the day, a Mrs. L, had a voice just like Anna Russell’s and along the way she gave us bits of information about points of interest, and when she came to them she was more excited than any of us – certainly more than me ’cause I was asleep most of the time – a great way to see London.

We stopped for coffee along the way and then saw Oxford College. We visited the college of Christ Church and went into the dining room consisting of many long tables, and various portraits along the walls. We ate lunch at a very nice place, and then we saw Romeo and Juliet which I enjoyed very much.

We ate supper at Ye Old Bull Head Inn, and had roast beef and Yorkshire pudding (bread dough). We got back to London at 11:00 and poor Alan had been waiting for me since 9:30. We saw the changing of the guards (sentry) at Buckingham Palace, took a walk, had coffee and then I came home at 1:00! Beat!!

Today, Christ Church has about 450 undergraduate and 150 graduate students. The College, which is affiliated with the University of Oxford in London, became co-ed in 1980 and now women make up about half of the student body. Christ Church has hosted several notable students, including philosopher John Locke, author Lewis Carroll, and founder of Pennsylvania, William Penn. Albert Einstein also studied there for a brief time in the 1930’s.

More recently, different locations at the College were used as settings for scenes in the Harry Potter films.

Yorkshire pudding is an English dish that was traditionally cooked in a large tin. The pudding batter was made from eggs, milk, and flour. It was often served before the main entree in an effort to fill people up and as a result, conserve portions of meat.

The origin of the recipe is unknown, but the name of Yorkshire pudding is credited to Hannah Glasse – in 1747, she published the recipe in her book, The Art of Cookery made Plain and Easy.

Today, British Yorkshire Pudding Day is celebrated on the first Sunday in February.

Who is Anna Russell and what does her voice sound like? Ms. Russell (1911-2006) was an English-born comedienne whose one-woman shows became a major success in the early 1950s. Her musical parodies interlaced with deadpan humor entertained audiences on both sides of the Atlantic for many decades.

“My memories of Bunjies go back to the 1950s – no regular performers in those days – frequented by out of work actors, students (medics mainly), nurses and office workers (me) who wanted a bit of the boho scene.
Someone composed this song which we sang lustily to frowns from the management:

Old poppa Beethoven wrote this little song
To keep us contented and happy all day long
Sitting in Bunjies my heart began to throb
For one Cappuccino would set me back a bob
And for a sandwich, I’d have to sell my soul
For six weeks I’ve saved up to buy a sausage roll.

The medics would often bring in their skeletons and put the skulls over the wall lights, making the cellar look even more eerie. Someone would bring a guitar, someone else bongos and off we would go.”

Last night no one could sleep so we all got up at 2:30 am and set around on the top bunks having a chocolate party which consisted of stuffing ourselves with Sue’s box of Swiss chocolates! We were up at 7:00 for breakfast and were supposed to arrive at Plymouth at 10:00, but we were two hours late. So Dietrich and Gunter, our German waiters, were surprised to see us at lunch. We turned in our landing cards on ship, and boarded another ship which took us into Plymouth (the same place the Pilgrims started from, only it took them 54 days).

We took a train to London (took 5 hours) and were awfully impressed with the scenery. We saw the white chalk horse carved in the hillside. and everyone had high tea on the train which was a regular meal.

We had just gotten off the train and were getting our luggage when Alan came up. Was I surprised. He drove back to our hotel, The Royal, in his Morris, and waited while I checked in.

We went to a coffee shop called Bunjie’s, which was very Bohemian, and everyone sat around wooden benches at wooden tables. After that we walked around London holding hands! Alan is really nice! Got a letter from mom. (Bed at 2:15.)

Bunjies Coffee House and Folk Cellar, allegedly named after a pet hamster, was located just off Charing Cross Road at 27 Litchfield Street, WC2. The 400-year-old former wine cellar provided a performing space where diverse forms of alternative entertainment could be enjoyed six nights a week.

Bunjies was one of the original folk cafes of the 1950s and a regular haunt of writers, singers, comedians, and cartoonists – included in its roster of performers were Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, Phil Collins, and David Bowie. It remained an influential music venue until its closure in 1999.

The white chalk horse that Judy is referring to is one of the eight visible chalk carvings in Wiltshire in the UK. Some of the horses date back 250 years.